


Midnight In The Mess Hall

by Britpacker



Series: Making It Real [8]
Category: Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-20
Updated: 2012-07-20
Packaged: 2018-08-15 17:08:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8064946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Britpacker/pseuds/Britpacker
Summary: It’s the end of a tough day for Lieutenant Reed.  Despite his destination, a late snack is the last thing on his mind…





	

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Kylie Lee, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Warp 5 Complex](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Warp_5_Complex), the software of which ceased to be maintained and created a security hazard. To make future maintenance and archive growth easier, I began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in August 2016. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but I may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Warp 5 Complex collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/Warp5Complex).
> 
>  **Author's notes:** This is (for the time being, unless another idea hits me) the last of the series. Unbeta'd, not mine, PWP... you know the drill.

Lying full length under the serving counter with his head and shoulders jammed through a small hatch protecting the power relays, Trip was cursing lustily as he walked in, absently raising the lights to a barely-safe level. "Commander? You in here?"

"Hey, Malcolm." Dropping his tools, Tucker used both hands to lever himself back out of the slot, grinning up at the Armoury Officer as Reed swayed between tables toward him. "Whatcha doin' here at this time of night?"

Crossing his arms, Reed smirked at the prone man. "I think you'll find that's my line! Doing maintenance after twenty-three hundred when your shift finished five hours ago isn't standard behaviour for a Chief Engineer, you know - even on this ship!"

"Yeah, but I kinda promised Chef I'd take a look at his faulty hot plates, and I couldn't do that 'til he'd finished for the night." From this angle the Englishman looked tired, Trip realised, hauling himself up to lounge against the counter's edge. Actually, from any angle his lover looked dead beat and, more uncharacteristically, definitely untidy. His hair dishevelled, jumpsuit unzipped halfway down his chest, the sleeves pushed up to expose muscular forearms, Lieutenant Spick-'n'-Span was a mess, albeit an incredibly appealing one. "What about you? Looking for a late-night snack?"

Stormy eyes flickered over him in an assessing glance. "Not exactly."

"You stabilised the torpedoes?" Trip asked, unaware of the slow circuit his tongue made around prickly-dry lips. Malcolm smiled.

Not his usual half-smirk, or the less frequent full-blown dazzling grin: this was a slow uncurl of sweet pink lips that seemed reluctant to let go of his confident affirmation. "They're not going to detonate in the launch tubes, if that's what you're worried about, Commander."

With a sleepy-eyed, drooping Reed swaying perilously near the borders of his personal space - not something he'd allow to happen with anyone else in the universe, Trip realised with a shimmer of pride - the only thing he was worried about detonating was the weapon charging up in his pants. "Tough day?" he asked, the words unnaturally hoarse to his sensitised ears.

"Hmmm. Fourteen hours of crawling 'round the tubes and fiddling with the sensor arrays. My back is killing me."

"You're lookin' a little hunched around the shoulders." Trip knew the feeling, and his own spasmed in sympathy. "Want a massage?"

"That's what I tottered to your quarters hoping to hear." Instead he'd got the condescending neutrality of their resident Vulcan across the corridor informing him that Commander Tucker was undertaking a minor repair in the mess hall, and his throbbing feet had carried him there without bothering to obtain his lethargic brain's permission. 

The few random neurons still firing inside his skull were warning him this had been a very bad move. The combination of bone-deep tiredness, minimal illumination that made the engineer's lightly tanned skin shimmer and that oh-so-compassionate voice enveloping him in its treacly warmth were circumstances guaranteed to play havoc with the remnants of his self-control. Then that engineer's large, capable hands curled around his granite-hard shoulders and the last flicker of Lieutenant Reed's common sense was snuffed out.

"Easy, darlin'," The man melted into his lightest touch and carefully Tucker eased him around until their positions were reversed, Malcolm sagging heavily against the counter's support while Trip's blunt fingertips dug hard into solid knots of muscle. How the Brit didn't yelp in agony, he would never know. "Dontcha go swoonin' on me, now."

Too dazed for a snarky response Malcolm whimpered, trying to press his abused muscles deeper into his partner's skilled grasp. One by one the cramped tissues began to soften, the pleasure of each release almost painful, and greeted by another small bubble of throaty sound. Trip's whispered endearments trickled over him, almost as effective as another caress. He was liquefying from the inside out, and it was absolute heaven.

For Tucker it was rapidly descending into a twisted kind of sensual hell. Malcolm, pliant and unguarded in the middle of the mess, putty in his loving hands. How long had he dreamed of seeing his boyfriend that way in this place?

Reed lolled over the serving bar, barely sensate while his masseur's strokes lengthened, their pressure spreading out from his spine to stretch the smooth flesh of his lower back. Trip's thumbs made neat circles in the small's dip, stretching the heavy twill of his jumpsuit before sliding forward to mimic the movement on his flat stomach. "Triip," he whimpered, a shock racing through him in time with an index finger's slip south toward his groin. "Mmmm, nice."

It wasn't fair. It was taking advantage of his boyfriend's exhausted state. Malcolm likely wouldn't agree to this if he was thinking straight. Yet cupping the soft weight of the Englishman's balls, lightly squeezing through layers of regulation cloth and being assailed by memories of other places and times, Trip couldn't stop himself.

"Let me take care of you, Malcolm," he breathed, flicking the tip of his tongue against the delicate shell of the younger man's ear. The dark head tilted sideways, offering up access to the graceful line of the neck and exposing the base of Reed's throat, shadowed by the fold of his unbuttoned shirt collar. "That's what you wanted, yeah? I can make you feel real good, you jus' relax and let it happen."

"Please." The lethargy of overwork was dissolving into something sweeter, something that made the blood tingle in his veins even as it continued to flow unhurriedly, all of it heading south. He felt light-headed, his fingers clawing at the worktop for support, and behind him something firm and inviting prodded amiably into his buttocks. He wriggled against it, a small giggle escaping his throat as it jerked in answer. Malcolm forgot their location; forgot the presence of a skeleton crew on duty, any one of whom might wander in for a reviving caffeine hit in the middle of their shift. There was just the counter holding him upright, and the warmth that was Trip Tucker, enveloping him. Making him feel safe.

Making him quiver as his eyes drifted shut and cool, night-temperature regulated air stung newly-exposed skin. He was vaguely conscious of the coverall hanging below his waist, his shirt gaping open; of the press of flattened palms inside his briefs, stretching the tautness of his cheeks and exposing the cleft to a clever, ticklish finger. Unthinking, he ground himself against the single digit, thrilled by the faint buzz of dry penetration. "Hmmmm," somebody hummed.

"Whoa there, gotta do this right." Disrobing efficiently, Tucker delved into his abandoned toolbox and dipped his fingers in a small pot of oil. Malcolm bucked impatiently against his other hand, too lost in his trance to grasp the cause of his lover's delay. With a rash disregarded for Chef's carpeting he was sure to regret later Trip let half the contents of the tub gush down that tempting gully, wrapping an arm around Reed's midriff to still the brunet's squirm against its sudden stimulation. 

Wanton, Malcolm spread his legs wider, incoherent half-pleas slipping out between short, rasping breaths. "Trip... need... God yes... mmmmm fuck... inside...oh God."

What was left of the oil doused the blond's painful cock and he shuffled forward, guiding himself home into the familiar welcoming tightness. Their sighs synchronised as perfectly as their movements while slowly, keeping a lazy pace, they ground together, heat spreading from their join into their bellies and higher, completely possessing them.

"Aaaahhh, so good Malcolm." Trip mouthed the words into the sweet spot where neck and shoulder met, worrying the tender flesh with his teeth, unconsciously moved to leave his livid brand on his mate's exquisite creamy skin. One arm restricting the brunet's movement he let his free hand wander, tweaking a nipple for the blissful clench of aftershocks that ran down into his man's ass. His penis throbbed and he grasped blindly for the sleek, hot staff of his partner's, sweeping from base to head in a long, sweet stroke. "Come for me, darlin'. Lemme feel you losin' it!"

To Reed the distant thrum of that seductive voice was another caress, stroking him as deep as the thick length nudging toward his hottest spot. His loud moan when the two connected broke the galley's quiet but, caught up in the heady sensation of being surrounded by his love, Trip was oblivious to the volume change. Malcolm convulsed beneath him, the blond's chest sliding over his sweaty back as he stiffened and strained to climax, soaking his partner's clenching hand with his heat.

The firm passage around him tightened and the minimal pressure-change was all it took to send Trip careering over the edge in the Brit's wake, a sob of relief breaching the barrier of his puckered lips as they relaxed into ecstasy. He didn't hear the distant scrape of the mess hall doors sliding to and fro in rapid succession.

Commander T'Pol hesitated beyond the frosted glass barrier, her impassive gaze focussed on the two shadowy figures bent over Chef's pristine counter. What had drawn her to come in search of her colleagues? She could not accept it might have been curiosity. That would not be logical.

Her acute hearing picked up the vibration of a lazy chuckle leaking out through a gap at the bottom of the door - Reed's, she realised, mildly surprised by the treacly quality of the Englishman's voice in the afterglow. " _Much_ better now."

"Ah aim t' please." Tucker's slurred reaction triggered a score of memories and the Vulcan turned sharply away, her swift steps echoing the length of the corridor. Her theory had been confirmed. The commander and the lieutenant were becoming indiscreet in the conduct of their liaison. 

Something twanged in her belly but she kept walking, her head high as she passed a pair of yawning crewmen ambling in the opposite direction. "Mr Wallace. Mr Seddon. I believe your shift break is not scheduled for another twenty minutes."

"Er - yes, Commander." Seddon, the senior of the two, turned puce; Wallace grey. Humanity's reaction to embarrassment and guilt, she reflected, revealed itself in what Doctor Phlox would consider to be a fascinating variety of ways.

She paused, allowing her subordinates to escape with a little dignity before summoning the turbolift and selecting B Deck as her destination, hurrying along its length to her quarters. Commander Tucker, to use his own phrase, owed her big-time.

With deft, unhurried movements she prepared her meditation candles and sank gracefully to her knees. Happiness was a sentiment for humans, but she could acknowledge she was pleased to see Trip experiencing it with Lieutenant Reed. They were, as she had heard many of her crewmates whisper in recent months, good for each other.

The faintest glow of a smile in her dark eyes, T'Pol lost herself in the peace her meditation alone could bring her.

*

Malcolm sagged in a chair, his hands hanging limply between his thighs while Trip scrubbed the residue of their encounter from the underside of Chef's counter with his scrunched blue briefs. "Not quite how you imagined it," he observed, a frown deepening the furrow between his eyebrows at the lingering huskiness of his voice. " _Bent over our favourite table in the middle of lunch service_ , wasn't it?"

"Yeah, well, I'll take what I can get." He regarded the balled-up wad of wet fabric for a moment before tucking it inside his coverall - together with the shirt and tank he hadn't wasted time returning to their proper places, Reed remembered, giving his own restored collar a delicate tug. "You're getting better, Malcolm, but you're never gonna be exhibitionist enough for that!"

"For which Chef and Captain Archer should be profoundly thankful." With a cheeky grin Reed took his lover's proffered hand, giving his shoulders an experimental roll "And - thanks for the massage. I really only came looking for a neck rub."

"You've got such a sexy neck, darlin'." Pausing only to snatch up his toolkit and turn off the lights, Trip led his boyfriend toward the door, almost knocking into a couple of shipmates right outside. "Wallace. Seddon. You headin' for a break?"

"Um, yes Sir, it's twenty-three fifty-eight, and...."

His friendly smile, Trip discovered, only seemed to alarm their subordinates more. "As you were," he invited cordially. "Thanks for your help with the power relays, Malcolm. See you tomorrow, guys - and mind the hot plates. They'll take a while to cool off after the work we've been doin'."

The two crewmen's smothered squawks were cut by the closing of the door. Shaking his head, Trip reclaimed his partner's hand and hustled him toward the turbolift, the strange behaviour of two barely-recognised shipmates forgotten under the Englishman's sultry smile. 

"I hope _you're_ not cooling off, Mister Tucker," he murmured, brushing a kiss across the Southerner's nape. "I owe you a massage, I believe - in a private setting this time."

He could only hope nobody heard their howls of laughter as Enterprise's Chief Engineer chased her Armoury Officer all the way around B Deck.


End file.
